Mobile Number Portability to deepen competition – Juwah

A cross section of dignitaries at the unveiling

With the official commencement of the Mobile Number Portability (MNP) scheme by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) and all mobile network operators (MNO) is expected to deepen competition, says the chief executive officer, NCC, Dr. Eugene Juwah.

 

“Mobile Number Portability has been identified as one of such services that could further deepen the competition in the telecommunications market,” he declared.

Speaking to DigitalSENSE Business News (DSBNews) at the launch in Lagos on Monday, Dr. Juwah said that the vision of NCC is not limited to providing access to telecommunication services to Nigerians at affordable cost, but also to continue to enable the required stimulus and appropriate environment for the introduction of innovative services to impact on quality service delivery.

He noted that with increased reliance on mobile communications for daily socio-economic interactions, mobile subscriber numbers have become individual identities, mostly now that it has become a requirement for filling out forms in opening bank accounts, making hotel and airline bookings to name a few.

R-L, Director Regulatory Services Airtel Nigeria, Osondu Nwokoro, NCC Chairman

Peter Igoh  CEO/MD Airtel Nigeria, Segun Ogunsanya, Executive Vice Chairman NCC,

Eugene Juwah,  Senator Tony Adeniyi and Chairman House committee on Communication,

Hon, Oyetunde Ojo at the Flag Off of MNP Monday

With this launch, Juwah pointed out that consumers will simply take along their existing numbers along with them to any network of their choice.

“The power and freedom of choice will henceforth rest with the consumer,” he said, stressing that if a consumer is dissatisfied with the quality of service of his or her current network service provider, such a person could simply port out of that network to any network of his or her choice without losing their subscriber numbers.

However, NCC, he said, will not mince words in dealing with the abuse of the laid down regulations for MNP, as it’s anticipated these documents would provide guidance, promote transparency and healthy competition among service providers.

Glo fully ready for MNP: The representative of the Chairman, Senate

Committee on Communication, Senator Tony Adeniyi being welcomed

 to the Glo stand by the Head of Gloworld, Mrs. Titi Ebinisi (left) and

members of the Glo MNP Team, Mr. Issac Thomas, Dammy Olarinde

and Femi Steve during the launch of mobile number portability by

the NCC in Lagos on Monday.

Providing more details on MNP, the Managing Director of Interconnect Clearing House, the clearing house for the MNP, Mr. Uche Onwudiwe, said that port takes only about 48 hours to accomplish after sending ‘PORT’ to 3232 short code, although any successful porting takes about 90 days before another porting could happen, despite the kind of quality of the recipient network.

Porting he said, could only be effective after operators have send a Subscriber Identification Module (SIM) card to the porting consumer.

Further, he said, that its only fraudulent grounds that a consumer will be denied porting accessing.

Earlier, all the mobile operators reiterated their readiness for commencement of MNP, including Etisalat, Airtel, Glo and MTN.

Remmy Nweke/DSBNews

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